Veteran British actor SIR MICHAEL CAINE is still haunted by his experiences in the Korean War - insisting his life totally changed on the day he narrowly escaped death on the battlefield.

The Get Carter star was called up for national service in the British Army when he was aged 18 and was deployed to South Korea to help in the aftermath of the North Korean invasion.

Caine, who served as part of the Royal Fusiliers, admits he came close to losing his life during the conflict.

He says, "I was nearly killed. There were four of us on patrol in a valley in the middle of the rice paddies. The Chinese were closing in on us and the officer said, 'Let's run towards their line - they won't expect it because they'll be expecting us to run away towards our lines.' So we did that and we ended up going right around them. They couldn't find us because they were looking in the wrong place and we got away. But we'd faced that moment that we thought was the end.

"That night we went back to our bunkers and celebrated with a beer. We were just happy to be alive... I faced a moment when I knew I was going to die and I didn't run, I wasn't a coward, and it affected me deeply. I was at peace with myself and that's guided my life, not just in terms of whether someone's going to kill me, but in everything."
11/04/09 01:34